ABSTRACTThe recommendations and implementation of the IUCN conservation plan for African Insectivora and elephant‐shrews (Nicoll&Rathbun, 1990) are reviewed. Of the 33 species and subspecies of elephant‐shrews, only six forest‐dwelling taxa are threatened. Until additional status data are gathered, assessed, and published no changes in the IUCN threatened categories should be made:Rhynchocyon chrysopygusis ‘vulnerable’;Rhynchocyon petersi petersiandRhynchocyon petersi adersiare ‘rare’; andRhynchocyon cirnei cirnei, Rhynchocyon cirnei hendersoni, andPetrodromus tetradactylus sangiare ‘insufficiently known’. Implementing status surveys that have not been completed, especially for the forms ofR. petersiandP. t. sangi, are a high priority.Rhynchocyon petersiandR. chrysopygusdensities are lower in altered and trapped forests compared with undisturbed forests. Because undisturbed forests in eastern Africa are highly fragmented, small, and disappearing due to human encroachment, it is important to determine the population dynamics ofRhynchocyonspp. that occupy degraded forest habitats, such as plantations, follow agricultural lands, and coastal scrub. In the face of the expanding human population, with its increasing need for land and natural resources,Rhynchocyonpopulations that occur in these degraded habitats may be all that rem